Salah Abdeslam, the main fugitive from Islamic extremist attacks in Paris in November, was arrested in Belgium’s capital Friday after four months at large, two French police officials told The Associated Press.
The mayor of the Brussels neighborhood of Molenbeek, Francois Schepmans, confirmed two people were injured in the operation, which she said are continuing. She couldn’t confirm Belgian media reports that Salah Abdeslam, the main fugitive from the Paris attacks, was one of two people hurt.
French president Francois Hollande told reporters in Brussels he would not give details on the “operation that is under way.”
As Friday’s events unfolded, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel rushed out of a European Union summit, and was expected to be joined at Belgian government offices by Interior Minister Jan Jambon, RTBF said.
In Tuesday’s raid, two people escaped from the home in the Forest neighborhood of Brussels, but Belgian federal prosecutor Eric Van der Sypt said it wasn’t yet known if Abdeslam was one of them. He also said it hasn’t been established how old the fingerprints were, or how long Abdeslam spent in the apartment on the Rue Du Dries.
Abdeslam fled Paris after the Nov. 13 gun and bomb attacks that killed 130 people at a theatre, the national stadium and cafes. Most of the Paris attackers died that night, including Abdeslam’s brother Brahim, who blew himself up. The Islamic State terror group claimed responsibility for the attacks, in which Belgian nationals played key roles.
Police who raided the apartment Tuesday found an ISIS banner as well as 11 Kalashnikov loaders and a large quantity of ammunition, the prosecutor said.
A man was shot dead by a police sniper there as he prepared to open fire on police from a window. Police identified him as Mohamed Belkaid, 35, an Algerian national living illegally in Belgium.
A Kalashnikov assault rifle was found by his body, as well as a book on Salafism, an ultraconservative strain of Islam.
Police who went to search the apartment “were not expecting a violent armed reaction,” Prime Minister Charles Michel said.
Four officers, including a French policewoman, were slightly wounded when they were shot at as they opened the door.
Abdeslam slipped through a police dragnet to return to Brussels after the Paris attacks, and though he is the target of an international manhunt, has not been seen since.
In January, Belgian authorities said one of his fingerprints was found alongside homemade suicide bomb belts at an apartment in another area of Brussels. Belgian prosecutors said it wasn’t known whether he had been at the address in the Schaerbeek district before or after the Paris attacks, or how long he had spent there. AP/FoxNews
